


Technically Adept

by 221BJen (jcoz1701)



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: AU, Awkward Flirting, Bucky is the IT guy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-12
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-08-08 06:23:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7746544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jcoz1701/pseuds/221BJen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky is the IT guy and Steve awkwardly flirts via service tickets.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Technically Adept

**Author's Note:**

  * For [EnduringChill](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EnduringChill/gifts).



> This is for my dear friend EnduringChill's birthday. It's my first foray into the Marvel fandom and I had a lot of fun writing it. 
> 
> The idea started in a gchat conversation as most of our ideas do. 
> 
> Thank you to Callie4180 and gowerstreet for their super secret beta work. You guys rock!

Bucky pushed his hair irritably behind his ear as he looked over the ticket that had just arrived in his inbox. Rogers.  _ Again _ . He couldn’t tell if the man was technologically inept or just had incredibly bad luck. He had replaced almost every component that could be replaced in the man’s desktop and was seriously considering just handing him a pen and notepad and sending him on his way.

Rogers’ email was down.  _ Again _ . It was the third time this week, and Bucky had yet to figure out exactly what the man was doing to it. Last time, Rogers had managed to delete the icon from his desktop and Bucky had forced himself to smile politely as he put it back. 

“Nat?” Natasha was studiously ignoring him from the other cubicle in favor of whatever she was listening to on her earbuds. He threw a paper clip that bounced off her screen and smiled when she turned to glare at him. “Rogers messed up his email again, can you take it?” 

She turned back to her screen. “Nope.” 

He made a face at her back. “Please? I’ll bring you Starbucks tomorrow.”

“You’ll bring me Starbucks anyway. And the answer is still no.” She spun around in her chair and gave him a disconcerting grin. “Besides, he always asks for you.” The grin grew brighter and more worrying. “I think he  _ likes _ you.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, right.” Rogers was good-looking in that clean cut, All-American way, and the rumor was he was dating that blonde from Accounting, Sharon something. “Isn’t he dating Carter on the fifth floor?”

“Nope.” Natasha always seemed to know everything that was going on in the office gossip at Fury Technologies, so he trusted her judgement. “As far as I know, he’s single.”

Bucky made a noncommittal noise. Once again, she had managed to distract him from the real problem. “Whatever. Would you take his ticket?”

“Nope. That’s all you. I’m sure he’d  _ love  _ for you to take his ticket.” She turned back to her screen and tucked her earbuds back into her ears, returning the rude gesture that Bucky shot behind her back.

\--

Bucky took the long way, swinging by the break room to snag a donut before finally tapping on the door marked ‘Steven G. Rogers - Financial Security.’ It swung open, and Bucky stood with his hand raised dumbly as Rogers gave him a blinding smile.  _ God, the man even had perfect teeth _ . 

“There you are,” he said, as if Bucky had been lost in the woods. “I’m really sorry for having to call you up here again but…” He waved at the screen helplessly. Bucky pasted a patient smile on his face, the one that Nat told him was borderline creepy. He knew that he should probably work on that.

“No problem, it’s what I’m here for.” He walked around the desk and silently cursed choosing a profession that involved getting so up close and personal with people, always leaning over shoulders or reaching past them for the mouse. This time was no different. He leaned over Rogers’ shoulder, ignoring how solid it felt. “What’s it doing this time?” 

“It’s not sending.” Rogers shrugged, giving him a sheepish smile. “It was working earlier.” 

Bucky sighed and stepped back. “Can I sit?” he said, gesturing to the desk chair. Rogers got up and Bucky took his place, immediately pulling up the network connection to check it first. Disconnected. That was weird. He reconnected it and checked to make sure the email was working again before standing up. Rogers was leaning against the desk beside him, arms folded across his chest, and Bucky was momentarily distracted by the way that the rolled up sleeves of the white button up made his forearms stand out. Shit. “All fixed,” he announced, rolling the chair back and earning another dazzling smile. 

“That looked easy.” Rogers still leaned against his desk and Bucky could swear that he gave him a look up and down before moving out of the way. “You’re really good at this.”

Bucky  _ blushed _ . What was wrong with him? He didn’t  _ blush _ . Especially when a buttoned up, blond  _ businessman _ with perfect teeth told him he was doing his job well. “Uh, thanks?” Bucky almost gritted his teeth for being so fucking awkward. “Just let me know if it stops working again.” 

“Will do.” Rogers was so  _ freaking cheerful, _ and his eyes were so blue. He nodded and gave Bucky that subtle up and down look again. “Till next time.”

Bucky definitely walked back to his cubicle faster than normal. Natasha laughed and shook her head when he flipped her off again.

\--

It was two more days before another ticket popped up in his inbox. Bucky stared at it for a minute,  and then looked at Natasha to gauge whether or not he could talk her into taking it this time. He would need to up his game to convince her. He scooted his chair over next to hers and tapped a wheel with his toe. “Hey, Nat-”

“No.” She wasn’t even looking at him and had ear buds in, for Christ’s sake.

“But, Nat-” He was not above begging.

She stared at her screen and typed something quickly. His IM alert pinged and he looked over at his own monitor.

**NatRom: No.**

Bucky growled under his breath.

**JamBar: Please. I’ll bring you Starbucks AND one of those chocolate croissant things that you like.**

**NatRom: No.**

**JamBar: But his printer won’t print and it’s probably because he accidently deleted the driver. Again. For the third time.**

**NatRom: No.**

A second notification window popped up and Bucky clicked on it.

**SteRog: I am so sorry to bother you but I tried restarting and that didn’t seem to fix anything.**

**SteRog: And I’m getting ready for a meeting with Coulson. Is there any way that you can come to my office?**

**SteRog: Sorry again.**

**JamBar: I’ll be right there.**

Bucky sighed. If the man wasn’t so damn polite it would make it easier to brush him off. He clicked back to his conversation with Natasha.

**JamBar: I hate you.**

**NatRom: No.**

\--

Bucky dragged himself up to Steve’s office and paused in the hallway for a moment, wondering when he started thinking of him as ‘Steve’ instead of just ‘Rogers.’ It was a little bit unsettling. The door was open so he couldn’t stand out there all day. Might as well get it over with.

Steve greeted him with “Oh, thank god you’re here,” when he walked in, so Bucky got right to work. 

He can’t help but notice that Steve was not his usual put-together smiling self. His hair was ruffled from where he’d been running his hand through it, and his sleeves were sloppily pushed up rather than neatly folded. Bucky took pity on him. “I’m sure it’s something simple.”  

“I have this big meeting with Coulson and I need to print out this  _ stupid _ report and the damn thing just blinks at me!” Bucky looked at him, and he could see the panic starting to form. He looked for the driver, because of course that’s what it was.

“Steve.” He didn’t know why he said it but he felt bad for Steve. He looked like he was on the edge of a panic attack.  Bucky was well versed in those. “Steve, it will be fine.”

“If I don’t get that report-” 

Bucky cut him off after clicking to start the download for the proper driver. “Stop. Do you trust me?” Where did that even come from? Bucky just wanted to calm the guy down before he hyperventilated, and now he was talking about trust? It took him back to the time just after the Army, before he was able to hold down a reasonable job. He had panic attacks just about every day, so he was kind of an expert.

Steve took in a shaky breath. “Yeah. I trust you.”

Bucky found himself with his hand on Steve’s arm somehow. “Then let me fix this. Okay? It’s already almost done.” He got a weak smile in return but Steve seemed to calm down. Bucky realized that his hand was still on Steve’s arm. He snatched it away when he noticed how warm the other man’s skin was. He cleared his throat and turned back to the screen. It looked like everything was fine now, and he printed a test page. 

The printer whirred to life. “You are a miracle worker!” Bucky blushed at the praise and the feeling of Steve’s hand patting his shoulder.  _ What was wrong with him? _

“Um, you’re welcome?” Steve gave him a bright white-toothed grin and Bucky couldn’t help but smile back. They stared at each other for just a moment too long before Bucky got up from the chair and slid past where Steve had been hovering anxiously. “I’ll, um, see you around. I guess?” Bucky winced. He just wanted to get the hell out of there and not think about why he was being so fucking weird right now.

“Yeah, sure. Thanks again!” Steve sat down in his chair immediately and brought up the report that he thought was doomed, Bucky seemingly forgotten. Bucky took the hint and left.

\--

Natasha was waiting for him when he got back, leaning back in her chair with her boots on her desk. All that she needed was a bag of popcorn. “So. How’d it go?”

Bucky grunted and flopped down in his chair. “I don’t even know.” He didn’t, not really. It was a simple fix but he couldn’t get the thought of Steve’s panicked face out of his head. He could feel Natasha’s eyes on him and turned to his screen to avoid looking at her. His IM notification pinged.

**SteRog: Thanks again for your help. You’re a lifesaver.**

Bucky closed the window and put his head on his desk. He could almost hear Natasha smiling. “That well, huh?” 

“Leave me alone, Nat.” She snorted. He rolled his head to the side to glare at her properly. “This is all your fault, you know.”

“My fault? I’m not the one that’s being seduced by IT ticket.” 

Bucky sat up and spun around to face her. “I’m not being seduced!” He may have sputtered a bit. Natasha just raised an eyebrow at him. “I’m  _ not _ .” He put his head back down on his desk. “He didn’t even try to flirt this time.”

She snorted again. “You poor thing. Did the hot guy ignore you?” 

“He didn’t ignore me, he just, I don’t know, seemed like he really needed help this time.” He rolled to the side again to look at her. “And yes, he’s fucking hot, happy?”

“Ecstatic.” 

Bucky groaned and thumped his head on his desk.

\--

It was a whole week before Bucky received another ticket from Steve Rogers. “Nat?”

“Nope.” There was a special little pop on the P. 

Bucky looked down at the grubby jeans and t-shirt he was wearing. He had just finished installing some new cable which had involved climbing around in the ceiling. Of course that would be when Rogers would need something. “But Nat, I'm filthy.” He gestured to the dark smear of  _ something _ on his shirt. 

She looked him up and down, smirking. “Oh yes, you're a dirty,  _ dirty _ boy.” 

Bucky gaped at her for a moment, closed his mouth with a click and then turned on his heel and marched out of the room. 

\--

Bucky tried to brush the worst of the dust out of his hair, but then just gave up. If the guy insisted on calling only him, then he would just have to deal with it. He regretted this decision the moment he walked into Steve’s office. Steve was back to his usual self, which included a very sharp cobalt shirt that made his eyes even more startlingly blue. Bucky wondered if it was too late to hide in the breakroom until it was time to go home. 

“Oh good, you’re here.” Steve looked at him and then did a double take at his disheveled appearance. “Wow, that’s quite a look there, James.”

It was the first time that Steve had actually used his name. “Um, Bucky.”

“What?” 

Bucky cleared his throat and wished that the floor would just swallow him whole. “James is my first name but I typically go by Bucky. It’s a nickname.”  _ Oh god, stop talking! _

“Okay, Bucky.” Steve said it slowly, like he was testing out how it felt in his mouth. He grinned. “I like it.”

“Thanks?” He was supposed to be doing something...oh yes. “So, the mouse is broken?”

Steve straightened from where he’d been leaning on the desk. “Yeah, not sure what’s wrong with it. It just stopped working.” He looked Bucky up and down again. “So, what’s with the casual look today?”

Bucky wiped at his shirt self-consciously. “Running cable. Crawling around in the ceiling isn’t glamorous, but someone needs to do it.”

Steve smiled. Then he looked closely at Bucky’s face. “Um, you have something...right there.” He reached over and swiped a thumb across Bucky’s cheek, showing the streak of grey dust that he found there. “Got it.”

Bucky knew his eyes had to be huge. “Uh, mouse?”

“Right.” Steve stepped to the side to allow Bucky access to his desk. Bucky sat down and moved the wireless mouse. Nothing. He flipped it over to check to see if the battery was dead and popped open the little compartment. The battery was in...wrong.

“Huh.” Bucky flipped it around and closed the compartment. It worked fine now, of course. “Um, that was the problem.”

Steve laughed. “Okay, now I feel dumb for making you come up here. I dropped it and the battery came out. I must have put it in backwards.” He clapped a rather large and warm hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “Sorry about that.”

“No, uh, no problem.” Bucky stood and took a step back from Steve toward the door. Why did the man have to be so stupidly attractive? And why did Bucky just feel so awkward around him?. He was reasonably smooth when it came to flirting but something about Steve made him feel like a teenager with his first crush. God. Nat was going to be  _ merciless _ .

Steve gave him another smile before sitting down at the desk. “See you later, then?”

“Sure.” Bucky turned and fled.

\--

He could feel Nat’s smirk at the back of his head. He thumped it on the desk again. “What the hell, Nat? What the hell.”

“You have absolutely no game, Barnes.” He popped his head up and glared at her.

“I have game!” He said indignantly. “I have so much game.”

“No, you really don’t. Remember that guy at that club-” He held up a hand to cut her off. 

“That was one time. Besides, this is work. You’re not supposed to have game at work.”

“Steve Rogers has game.”

Bucky thumped his head down on his desk again. “I hate you.”

\--

The very next day another ticket found it’s way into Bucky’s inbox. He blinked at it. There was technically inept and then there was  _ this _ . The guy was either a walking disaster or just perpetually unlucky. He glanced at Natasha who just rolled her eyes at him. He looked at the ticket again. This topped even the mouse battery incident from yesterday, and that was pretty bad. 

At least he didn’t look like he had just crawled out of dumpster this time. He stopped by the equipment storeroom to grab a new keyboard, and took a moment to check to make sure his hair hadn’t escaped the hair tie. He  wanted to look nice after yesterday’s grubbiness.

He knocked on Steve’s open door and walked right in, determined to at least seem confident. It lasted about two seconds before he looked at Steve and burst out laughing. Steve was furtively dabbing at his shirt with a paper towel and looked like he had poured an entire glass of water on himself. He looked up at Bucky and gave him a sheepish grin. “Yeah, I know. Go ahead and laugh.”

Bucky smiled. “What the hell happened to you?”

“I should only drink out of things with lids, apparently.” Steve was still trying to dry his shirt and Bucky was doing his best not to notice how clingy the wet fabric was. “As you can see, the shirt’s not the only casualty.” 

Bucky picked up the keyboard and water dripped from it. “I can see that.” He pulled the small trash can out from under the desk with his foot and tossed the whole thing. He turned to get a few paper towels, but was confronted with the image of Steve unbuttoning his shirt. He did  _ not _ squeak. Much. “Um, what are you doing?”

Seemingly unconcerned that he was giving Bucky a heart attack, Steve undid the cuffs. “I always keep an extra in my bag, and I don’t feel like sitting around in a damp shirt for half the afternoon. It’s not as nice, but luckily I don’t have any meetings this afternoon.” He shrugged the button up off, leaving him in a clingy white tank top, and Bucky couldn’t help but stare.

Because Steve Rogers was  _ built _ . 

_ He has a tattoo _ , Bucky thought wildly. It was some sort of shield done in swirling lines of red and blue on his left shoulder. He turned back to the desk, paper towels clutched in his hands. Keyboard. He had to replace the keyboard. He quickly wiped up the rest of the spilled water and watched Steve pull on a dark blue henley out of the corner of his eye. The keyboard rattled a bit when he set it down on the desktop. Steve gave him a concerned look.

“You okay?” 

Bucky took a deep breath before turning to give him his cultivated ‘I am being very patient right now’ smile, which was currently covering his ‘I want to climb you like a tree but that would be super unprofessional’ smile. Either way, he needed to change out this keyboard and get the  _ fuck _ out of this office before he spontaneously combusted. “Fine. Just wanted to make sure that all the water was gone.” He knelt down to plug it in and used those few seconds to pull himself together. He stood and tapped the spacebar, bringing the screen back to life. “There you go. Try and keep liquids out of this one, alright?”

Steve rubbed the back of his neck and looked at Bucky from underneath his lashes. He started to say something and then stopped, evidently changing his mind. “Um, will do. Thanks again.”

“Sure. Anytime.” Bucky put his hands in his pockets, feeling like he should say something more but he had no idea what. “I better go.”

“Right.” Steve gave him a nod. “See you around?”

“Yeah.” Bucky backed toward the door. “You know where to find me, I guess.” He turned around and grimaced. Why had he said  _ that _ ? He heard Steve chuckle behind him.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

\--

Later that afternoon, Natasha had gone to get them both coffee from the break room. He knew she was just using that as an excuse to gossip with Barton, so he didn’t expect her back anytime soon. Which is why he almost fell out of his seat when she stalked back into their shared office, eyes blazing. 

“You will never guess what Barton told me.” She plopped down in her own chair and dragged him over toward her so that she could keep her voice low. 

“That they finally added pimento cheese to the sandwich menu in the cafeteria?”

“Did they?” She shook her head. “No. You remember the other day when there was that big issue with the projector in the big board room that had miraculously fixed itself by the time I got there?”

Did he ever. She had ranted on and on about people wasting her time until he had finally promised to go and get her a latte if she would just, for the love of god, stop. “Yeah, I remember.”

“Guess who fixed it.” Her eyes were bright and she had that infuriating half-smirk on her face that meant that whatever the answer was, it was good. Bucky rolled his eyes.

“Come on, Nat. Just tell me.” He’d heard that the whole system for that room had to be restarted and that wasn’t something that just involved pushing a button. Whoever fixed it evidently knew what they were doing.

“Fine. You’re no fun.” She leaned back in her chair, scowling. “Steve Rogers.”

Bucky felt like someone just threw cold water on him. “What?”

“You know what that means, right?” Natasha crossed her arms over her chest, a rare grin on her face. He shook his head slowly, trying to process and she rolled her eyes. “It means, you idiot, that all of those stupid ‘problems’,” she actually made air quotes at him, “were just because he wanted to see you. You should ask him out.”

Bucky couldn’t wrap his head around any of that. “No. Really?”

“Obviously.” She leaned forward again. “What are you going to do about it?”

“I don’t know.” She made a frustrated noise and he stood, pacing the length of room. “I mean, what if he was just fucking with me, you know?”

She shook her head. “No way.” She put her feet up on her desk, watching him pace. “The way I see it, he’s just as awkward as you are. You’re soulmates. You should jump on that quick.”

“Nat!” Bucky stopped pacing and stared at her. “I’m not awkward.”

“Sure. Go ask him out and quit being a coward.” She clicked on something on her screen and he could see her IM chat window pop up. She was already reporting the situation to Barton while he was still in the room. She made a shooing gesture. “Go on.”

“Not a coward,” he mumbled, but she had a point. Fuck it. What did he have to lose? He turned toward the door before he could lose his nerve. Natasha shouted at him as he walked down the hall. 

“You better tell me what happens, Barnes!”

“Not a chance!” He pushed the button on the elevator and saw her flip him the bird by sticking her hand out their door. He laughed.

He was going to do this.

\--

Bucky waited, leaning against the door frame of Steve’s office until the man finally noticed him. He looked up and jumped. “Jesus, Bucky, you scared me.” He looked confused for a moment. “I didn’t accidentally put in a service ticket, did I?”

“Nope. But you, Steve Rogers, are a liar.” Bucky did his best to look stern. 

Steve froze. “What?”

“You’ve been wasting company resources and compromising the very tight schedule that the IT department runs on.” There was no schedule. Unless someone specifically requested a certain technician, he and Nat usually chose who had to go by using increasingly elaborate versions of Rock, Paper, Scissors. 

“I don’t know what you’re-” Steve was stammering now, and damn if that wasn’t adorable. 

“Tell me, did you dump the water out on purpose or was that really an accident?” Steve slid back from his desk and covered his face with his hands. 

“That one was an accident, I swear!” Steve’s voice was muffled. “Oh god, you must think I’m an idiot.” 

Bucky straightened from his lean and walked toward Steve’s desk, closing the door behind him. He sat in the chair on the opposite side from Steve and laughed quietly to himself. How was this his life? Steve took his hands from his face and Bucky could see them twisting with anxiety in his lap. “I don’t think you’re an idiot.” 

“As you can probably tell, I am terrible at this.” Bucky snorted and Steve gave him a weak smile. Then his face fell. “If you want to report this-”

“No!” Bucky didn’t mean to say it as loudly as he did and Steve blinked at him in surprise. “I mean, no.” He ran a nervous hand through his hair. “Actually, I thought it was kind of funny.”

“You did?” Steve relaxed just a bit, his hands untangling themselves. “I mean, really?”

Bucky shrugged. “Yeah.” He leaned forward and grinned. “Well, here I am. Aren’t you going to do anything about it?” Steve stared at him uncomprehendingly for a moment and Bucky shook his head. “Man, you are terrible at this.”

“Oh! Oh, right.” Steve flushed up to his hairline and leaned forward just a bit, tracing the edge of his desk with a finger. “Um, so, um, would you like to have dinner with me? Tonight?”

Bucky smiled. “Yeah. I really would.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> PS - This may eventually have a smutty, first date sequel because I just can't help myself. EnduringChill, this is all your fault. Thank you :)


End file.
